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Starting Wednesday, all North Carolinians are now eligible for a Covid-19 vaccine. WHQR spoke with Dr. West Paul, chief clinical officer at New Hanover Regional Medical Center about the challenges ahead.
NHRMC Chief Clinical Officer Dr. West Paul (left) and WHQR s Ben Schachtman (right).
BS: Dr. West Paul, thanks for joining us. Let’s start with logistics Governor Cooper opened up the state to all vaccination groups this week, can the hospital ramp up?
PW: That s a good question. And I will tell you, our vaccine teams here were able to do really 1,000s in a day move that to a novel concept, which was The Pointe movie theaters [at Barclay], which strangely enough, really, the layout of that offered itself to a mass vaccination.
On this edition of Coastline, we meet two people from this community. One woman, one man. One in mid-life. One a young adult. They both live in the Cape Fear region. And while neither of them would say they feel despised or hunted or under attack here, they still must think about how mainstream local residents might respond to them. And this – the constant, necessary vigilance is the part that should not have been – but was news to this journalist. Listen • 49:51
Dr. West Paul, New Hanover Regional Medical Center’s chief clinical officer, said in the 30 years he’s worked in healthcare he’s never seen a year without a flu season until now.
“I have to attribute it to what we ve been doing with masking and everything else,” he said.
Masks have been a point of contention since the start of the pandemic, as the public debated over their effectiveness and the freedom to choose not to wear one. But a year later, with masks more widely accepted and normalized, Howard said it’s possible people will continue wearing them in public, even after mandates are gone and most of the population has received the COVID-19 vaccine.
All residents 16 and older are now eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccinations in North Carolina.
N.C. Gov. Roy Cooper announced in late March the state would accelerate its vaccination plan, allowing the general public to schedule vaccination appointments starting April 7. The move put North Carolina well ahead of President Joe Biden’s goal to have vaccines available to the general public by May 1.
This comes as New Hanover County sees a significant drop in coronavirus cases, particularly in older populations. New Hanover Health and Human Services Director Donna Fayko said the county saw no new COVID-19 related deaths reported in the last week after coronavirus cases remained high throughout the winter.